


Arson for Fun and Profit

by Jairissa



Category: Don't Trust the B---- in Apartment 23
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Drinking, F/F, Five-Year Plans, Hijinks & Shenanigans, Soulmate-Identifying Marks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-18
Updated: 2018-12-18
Packaged: 2019-09-21 14:16:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,162
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17045258
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jairissa/pseuds/Jairissa
Summary: June's Big Girl New York job was amazing. Sure, she hadn't met her soulmate yet, but she had the career, she had the apartment, and tonight she had the best end of financial year party that had ever been thrown.





	Arson for Fun and Profit

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Mierke](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mierke/gifts).



Office parties in New York were _amazing_. End of financial year parties in Indiana had already been fairly incredible; punch, cake, the fanciest streamers Michaels carried. If they were lucky, balloons . This was on a whole new level.

They were in a _club_. One of the trendy ones with loud music, reserved seating . Bottle services. June hadn't known those existed outside of HBO. Where everyone was beautiful, and danced, and drank. Now June was there too, on her _third_ glass of chardonnay and looking just as amazing as everyone else. Who knew that you could wear something this short to a work party and get complimented?

Being at a grown up job instead of an unpaid internship was better than June had imaged. Better than the best. Perfect. Her company had only rented out one of the floors for her party, which meant that all sorts of interesting people were wandering in and out. June could make a dozen new friends. A hundred. Maybe even (finally) meet her soulmate. 

Her five year plan dictated June meet her soulmate within the next month. If she didn't she would have to revise it to a six year plan, which was just not how it was done. June knew this well. She'd gotten an A+++ in that class and ruined the curve for everyone, so failing at it in real life was not an option. Especially not when she'd had to start wearing skirts so short that she spent half her work day tugging them back down for what turned out to be for nothing.

So maybe June didn't like the short skirts so much. What was with skirts like that? In Indiana was accustomed to being able to bend over to pick up her own pencils and knew the value of not getting frostbite on her thighs in the middle of winter. Why does she need to bother wearing a scarf to keep her neck warm when her knees were literally blue?

She definitely didn't like how many people said "Oh, hi," to her on the street, the most generic words she'd ever heard of. She could have met her soulmate 143 times, at last count. 143! She had almost been arrested one particularly embarrassing time after her breakup with he-who-shall-not-be-named, when she'd heard "oh, hi," from a gorgeous lawyer and she'd tackled him in the street, trying to force his clothes off so she could see what his words were, and where.

June wasn't 'cool', she knew that. She didn't really like music that was so loud she could feel it thumping through her temples, but that was what you did in New York. You danced, and you got grinded up against by guys (and girls!) that you'd never see again, who made you just a little bit uncomfortable. You smiled around at everyone anyway and saw your ex-fiance, curled around a brunette who looked nothing like you, sneaking through the useless security that was meant to keep your up-market company separated from all the beautiful drugged up party girls that were hanging off June's most passionate childhood crush and…

Wait, what?

Oh, no. No, no, no, no. Steven wasn't supposed to be there. Steven was supposed to be in Indiana with his nurse. With his insurance saleswoman and that girl that worked at the pool that June had always avoided because everyone knew it was full of fecal molecules. Steven had been erased from her five year plan, he wasn't allowed to be here, in the middle of June's success, draining all of her joy, and her pride and the progress she'd made…

Thank god June always picked the corner nearest the ladies room, so she could be the designated purse minder and make herself that little bit more useful. Well, those women could just protect their own money, because June needed to break her speed record, previously set at her church's cake run, when she was desperate to get Agnes Shard's prize winning lemon cake. (She had. It was delicious.)

June never could understand why women's rooms had queues longer than the average ride at Disneyland (she'd been to Disneyland! Her last company party had been at Disneyland!). The men's room, of course, was empty, but June was still not the kind of girl who could just stroll in there and throw up in the urinal like it was no big deal at all.

So she shoved herself past co-workers and party girls and waitresses, and found that of course with a line like that there wasn't going to be a stall open. There wasn't a urinal, either, so the best thing she could do was shove aside some random bartender that she knew would spit in her next drink and throw up in the sink. 

"What the hell, bitch, fuck, I mean ma'am!" Pee in her next drink, that's what it was going to be. She'd gone way past spit, into pee territory. June would accept it with a smile, because she needed so many more drinks right now, would take whatever treatment was required to get them.

Her vomit was blue and red. Wait, was that _blood_? No, that was the berry cocktail that she'd accepted from one of the CIOs because he'd been standing next to James van der Beek. She'd hoped that, just by osmosis, the liquid would absorb some of his essence, and June would have a part of Dawson inside her forever. 

"I said what the hell, ma'am," the bartender repeated, swinging June around. A mistake, of course, but since the woman was being so rude, and since those words weren't "oh, hi," June didn't try very hard when her stomach heaved. She threw up all over the bartender.

"You deserved that," June muttered. Three drinks was definitely June's limit. How could she be this drunk off three drinks? "I hope it stains."

The dark haired girl who had been with James van der Beek earlier, and had the sort of confidence June had to resort to buying in the form of expensive clothes and shoes, cackled. June tried to smile, wiped away embarrassing tears collapsed against the wall, uncharacteristically filled with misery.

"Steven oh god. Oh god, Steven!" She wailed to the dark haired girl, which hadn't been what she meant to say. But really, June had a really good reason to be a little out of her right mind, right? Of course she did. She'd walked in on Steven with his nurse, her sister and the president of June's sorority from her junior year. How had they even known each other?

The girl looked down at her with an expression June knew she deserved. It was disgusted, disappointed, a little gleeful and, June might just imagine this, a little afraid. 

"Sorry," June sobbed. "Sorry, I didn't mean…I mean, my ex-fiance just walked in, and he's with this girl, and she's _so beautiful_. Sorry, I'm so drunk. I mean, I'm June, hi."

And like that, with all the best timing in the world, because apparently the universe knew exactly when she was the lowest and decided it was the exact time to not just kick her but kick her out of a window directly into a dumpster filled with old Chinese food and probably some sort of angry raccoon, the girl spoke.

"Oh, hi," she drawled. June didn't bother to get excited. Her wrist has been showing all night. In between being shoved around and throwing up, crying on the dirty floor of a restroom, not nearly drunk enough to be this emotional, she was sure the girl had seen her words and was now using it to torment her.

It wouldn't be the first time a popular girl used that tactic. She thought she'd grown past that in college.

The girl left before June could call her on it. June was getting better at that. One day she might be able to come up with some sort of comeback in the moment, rather than three hours later when she would have been too much of a coward to say it anyway.

June wished she still had a best friend. But who can she tell that to? She has no husband, the first loss from her five-year plan. She can't tell her parents. It'd break their heart to know where she was, how she was, it was just easier to email them from the office sometimes and say that she's just so busy at work.

They like talking to Steven better anyway. June's pretty sure they blame her for not wanting to stay with him after he cheated. It's not like she has a soulmate, not really. She should be willing to take anyone who would take her. Steven didn't have a soulmate either. They should have been perfect together.

Steven didn't have a soulmate because he didn't have a soul was what June theorized. Or maybe the part of the universe that didn't center around her was kind and didn't give soulmates to people who would never be able to stay faithful anyway.

June wasn't like that, so why did she get the shaft? Why was the universe even more cruel to her than it was to everyone else who didn't have a soulmate? 

Because according to every registry, and department and listing, June did.

She had her soulmates first words,¬¬ "Oh, hi", twisting around her wrist, indicating that her soulmate was still alive. She had the occasional déjà vu that meant she was feeling what her soulmate did and could expect a particularly strong bond.

She just had no soulmate to go with it. 

There were check-ins now. People had to scan their words when they went through any kind of checkpoint. These words were transferred into some sciency thing nobody understood, which measured the 'resonance' of the bond and matched it to another person. June's soulmate checked into a lot of places. Too many places. That had been the first sign for the soulmate registry. No one could do that much, it just wasn't statistically possible. They'd checked politicians and celebrities. Sports stars and diplomats. Pilots and stewardesses. Drugged up heirs. None of them matched and no one, no one, she had been told, lived life that way.

Her soulmate had checked into this bar a week ago, which was part of why June had been so excited to come. She'd imagined him as a wall-street trader like herself, coming to one of the many parties that were held here at the beginning of July, the end of year they had been working so hard towards. Or maybe he was support staff, which was just fine, because while she wanted her Mary and her Christopher, she wasn't set on staying home with them herself. Maybe he'd like to quit his low paid job and look after the children while she brought home the bacon.

What if he was the rich man who owned the club, and would give up the party life for her? Or maybe, just maybe, he was some sort of drugged out junkie who liked women's toilets and would think a disheveled blonde trying to hide under the sink and dry retching through tears would be just the girl he wanted to spend the rest of his life with.

Oh, what did it matter. June used to go, to look around with casual looks and absolute desperation, and talk to everyone she met. She used the most unique sentences she could think of so that she could override her boring words and prove everyone wrong.

It never worked. Obviously it never worked. She met men, and women, and one particularly humiliating time a golden retriever that turned out to be a service dog trying to alert his owner to a epileptic seizure. 

June was hopeless, and too drunk, and not drunk enough.

Right, she could do this. She could get up, smooth out her hair, and smile into the mirror. Her makeup wasn't smudged, it was smoky. It was _fashionable_ , she looked like a…a prom queen! Prom Queens can handle anything.

Even Steven. June giggled. Even Stevens. She'd watched that show when her family had first gotten cable. That show had been great. She should see if she could find the DVD at some point. Where was her phone? Was it on Amazon? Or oooh. Could she binge it on Netflix, if binging counted as squishing in two episodes on her commute to work?

June took a deep breath and smiled at herself in the mirror. The bartender was still glaring at her and trying to wash June's multicoloured upchuck off her uniform, but the rest of the women around her had apparently forgotten it already. June, herself, had seen at least a dozen women crying in various bathrooms. She'd tried to help them at first, but three black eyes, on slapped cheek and four separate '*censored* offs' had taught her to mind her own business. 

It felt like Nice June was vanishing more every day. She didn't even feel guilty about the bartender, not when she had been so mean. New York was just…draining her June-ness away. Taking away the small town charm she'd been so proud of, and turning her into just another one of those heartless wretches she'd seen in Ally McBeal and as the totally wrong woman for the rich guy in all her mother's romance novels.

She was a little proud of herself for it, June was surprised to note. She was glad she wasn't the pushover that had let Steven keep her hanging, months after she'd known about the affairs. She can't believe that the end had come when _he_ dumped _her_ because she didn't want to move him and his two mistresses into her beautiful, hard-earned apparent.

Walking out of the bathroom with one large, calming breath, JUne threw on the smirk her boss had taught her when she'd taken credit for the report June had spent three solid all-nighters on in front of the board of directors. She tossed her hair over her shoulder, just like her former Pilates partner Stephanie had done when'd she'd told June they couldn't be friends anymore, because her boyfriend had proposed to her, and she wanted to lock that down before he turned into…well, June knew, right?

Yes, June knew.

She was beautiful. She was fashionable. She smelled nothing at all like vomit and the weird soap they always use in women's bathrooms. She was prom queen of this overly expensive cub, and she was going to own everything. Whatever that meant. June had never really worked out what that meant, but whatever it meant June was going to do it.

Instead of retreating to her post and making sure her dereliction of duty hadn't resulted in stolen purses, June made a beeline for the bar downstairs. There were no bartenders there that recognized her, and when she ordered three different cocktails at once…well, it was easy enough to pretend that she was buying for all her imaginary friends, rather than a sad, pathetic, soulmateless…

Her thoughts weren't going there. June wouldn't let them. Since there were no tables available, June held her elbows close to her body, squeezed two of the cocktails in the vice she'd created and downed the first one as quickly as she could. There was alcohol in there for sure. None of the mocktails she usually chose after her first glass of wine for June tonight. June tonight was drinking until she fell asleep in the gutter, which is apparently the place she belonged now.

The other two quickly follow, and rather than use that to guilt herself, June used the rest of her buzz to try to dance. She'd never been good at club dncing; she had a great foxtrot and could square dance with the best of them, but anything that made her feel all sexy had always made her feel so unlike herself.

Apparently the beat was meant to flow through her until it became instinctive, but as well as lacking a soulmate, June apparently also lacked any sense of rhythm. What she could do was jerk her hips back and forth like a 13 year old at a school dance in an 80s movie, so June threw herself into that, jerking herself back and forth for all she was worth.

Which, it turns out, made a doubly drunk June also very dizzy, so maybe dancing wasn't the best distraction. Could find a plant to hide behind, or…ooh. Someone was setting up a pyrotechnic display. June loved shiny lights, they reminded her of football games and Disneyland and Christmas at home with her parents. 

She stumbled towards them, the bright laser lights and the sparks of fire that flew up towards the ceiling, but never hit it. She watched them, fascinated, until all she could see was brightness and reflection, and a burning in her retina that left an after image whenever she closed her eyes.

"June? What the hell? What are you doing here?" It was Steven, because of course it was, that was just the sort of luck New York June had. 

"I work here," she said, somewhat slurred, throwing her arm over her head and gesturing towards the lights and the dancers. "I mean…I work…my company works here. No. Party. They party here."

Steven looked skeptical, which was unfair, because June's explanation had been flawless. He also looked pitying, which was rich when he wasn't even with the brunette he'd shown up with. He was with a tall striped pole, with high heels, and scruffy hair, and the smirk from the girl in the bathroom.

"Oh, hi," the girl said, and June would have been all right with that. She was used to it, to hearing her words all the time and always being disappointed. It's just that when Steven laughed, another one of the sparks went off behind him, and June's eyes blanked out a bit from the brightness of the lights.

"Aggghhhhh!" She shrieked, and shoved him. When he didn't move, when he started to laugh at her more, June braced herself as best she could in her high heels and leaped, tackling Steven past the barricade to the lights, and into the light display.

Steven grunted loudly when he landed. June stood up unsteadily, tugging her dress down from her waist. The club's logo, previously displayed in light on the wall now made the black haired girl, apparently more interested than disgusted, look like a walking advertisement. Actually, she always looked like that, so maybe this just made it obvious enough that even Drunk June could see it.

It turns out she'd managed to knock over her ex, while everything else kept on with it's bright, sparkly work. One of those sparks fluttered gently down onto Steven's coat. Steven, who had apparently been drinking as much as June had, because the spark flared to life, and then spread, a bright bonfire devouring Steven's cheap Walmart suit jacket.

The girl shrugged, and threw the remains of her cocktail on it. The fire shrank for a moment, then burst into life again, double the size and triple the heat.

"Yes!" June screamed. "Burn, you bastard, burn!"

A huff of warm breath at her neck alerted her to the arrival of half a dozen fire extinguishers, all of which June just managed to avoid with a twisty turny swivel of her hips that would have made a great move on the dance floor if she'd managed to work it out in time. She'd have to remember that, if she could remember anything in the morning.

She tried to squiggle back around, to watch Steven burn, or freeze, or whatever stupid thing he was doing now, but there was a vice grip on her arm that dragged her, (unwillingly as she made a point to loudly assert), away from the action and into a large group of people that were wearing more plaid than her hometown's annual lumberjack parade. 

"Time to go," the warm breath said against her ear. James Van der Beek, the beautiful Dawson Leery himself, looked over at her, actually looked at her, June Colburn, and laughed.

"What's this? Are you selling her for a sub later?" James said, flicking June's nose playfully. June stuck out her tongue, and managed to accomplish what she knew would be the ultimate brave act of her life. She licked James van der Beek's fingers.

"I'll explain later, we just have to go," the voice said. June made a sound of protest, making grabby hands towards June's beloved Dawson. "You can lick James later, just move."

June moved, because the idea of licking James van der Beek more was, as far as June could tell, the best thought she'd ever had. He'd tasted like tequila and horrible hand sanitzer, which wasn't pleasant, but that was all right. He'd taste much better when he fed her strawberries and chocolate, and…

Wait.

"Wait!" June said. "I left my coworkers purses alone upstairs. Someone might steal them."

The force guiding her out the door stopped for a moment, and she could feel the body turning away from her.

"Really," the voice said. James van der Beek's hand, wrapped in a handkerchief and disturbingly unlickable, reached in front of her.

"Chloe," he admonished, and the voice (Chloe?) made a displeased huff.

"Fine, I guess," she groaned. June felt like she should know that voice. Was she on TV too? Did June work with her? Why was her head so squidgy, her thoughts so hard to reach? "But we're coming back when she's sober and using her to get all that sweet Wall Street cash."

"Deal," Dawson der Beek said, his face smiling and beautiful and way too far away.

The cold air, contrary to every source June has seen before, does not help her think better. It doesn't help her eyes, either, which are still flickering with the after images of fireworks and fire. Still, it does feel nice, and it made the warm neck breath feel even warmer, which was a wonderful contrast.

The door slammed behind them, which put an end to any hope June had of running back inside; there was no way she'd be able to push open the door. Doors were heavy, and June felt very small. Why wouldn't she? The warm breath was at least another head taller than her. Steven had been that tall too. Was it Steven? Was he still on fire?

She jerked her hand away, and collected what was left of her thoughts to yell at Steven and maybe find another match or two to light him up more, but it wasn't Steven. It was bathroom girl, Steven makeout girl, and yeah. June was drunk, but even taking that into account, this really didn't make sense.

"What are you _doing_?" June asked. Was this drugs? Had June taken _drugs_? It that why James van der Beek and a girl she'd vomited in front of, and who had kissed her ex-fiance more passionately than June ever had, were standing next to each other with matching expressions of amusement and mild affection on their face.

"Saving you from an arson charge," Chloe said, scrunching her face up. "It isn't as fun as it sounds, trust me."

"Uh, why?" June asked. Chloe's hair is swaying a little in the wind and June reaches out to touch it, to see if it really is made of small, dark snakes. "Why would I trust you? We just met, and you laughed at me, and I nearly threw up on you, and you made out with my ex!"

"Well, I am your soulmate," the girl said, somewhat dismissively and a lot defensively. "It seemed like the right thing to do or whatever."

"Wha-" June thought she said, but also James van der Beek seemed to be falling on to the ground laughing, muttering something about ' _no way_ , and ' _I knew they'd get to you one day_. "But…you don't have my words. I can't even remember what my words to you were! And you're not wearing anything, so I can see everywhere they'd be!"

"Not everywhere," Chloe said, and tugged up the bottom of her dress. June squeaked, because Chloe wasn't wearing underwear, and there was ' _Steven oh god. Oh god, Steven!_ ' written up one thigh, across her…well, her place that June didn't mention in public!, and down the top of the other thigh. "I figured they'd be said during sex when I was pretending to be some guy called Steven, but throwing up multicoloured cocktails in a bathroom is all right I guess. I've do that a lot. And you do like fire, which means we have something in common."

"You didn't check in. To the club tonight, you-" June spluttered indignantly.

"Yeah, I've been staying there since last week. I found a back room with free alcohol and cocktail onions, it just seemed easier not to leave."

"I…?" June managed, and Chloe rolled her eyes, walking up behind hre, hauling her up like she was giving June the Heimlich maneuver and shoving her into a car that had been waiting. "Should you be driving?"

"It's not my car," Chloe said, shoving at June again so there was enough room for James van der Beek to slide in besides her. 

"Is it yours?" June asked James blearily, because her eyes were closing, and she didn't know whether she was going to pass out or cry right now. Her soulmate was real, an arsonist who threw up in bathrooms. June didn't do those things! She'd done them once, yes, but that was a very special occasion and, and…her soulmate couldn't be an arsonist! That was just inappropriate. How was she supposed to take an arsonist home to meet her parents?

"It's an uber," Chloe said, leaning back from where she had been whispering something in the drivers ear. She wasn't allowed to do that. She was meant to be whispering on June's neck, making the cold parts warm.

"When did you order an uber?" James asked, laughing a little and stroking June's hair. June leaned forward, not because she was going to throw up, but really because she was absolutely going to throw up and she didn't want to get it on anyone's shoes.

"I didn't," Chloe said, lifting her legs and swinging them over June's back and into James' lap. June promptly relieved the rest of her stomach onto the center console and started to cry. "Oh, don't worry. They'll just charge that to Macy's card."

"You can't do that, it's…" Wrong was what she meant to say. It was wrong. Her mouth was stuffy and gross, and she just wanted to be home. Where was home?

"Whatever, her name's Macy. She deserves it."

June just shook her head and remained leaning over because life was not making any sense. It was just easier to stay an inch over her own vomit and try and count the number of colors she'd expelled, to see if any of them would make a good color palate for her next knitting project.

The car stopped three blocks after it left.

"Are they kicking us out?" June asked. "I'm sorry."

"No, I just didn't want to carry you three blocks," Chloe said, leaning over June to open her door. Rather than help her out it, Chloe shoved at June's lower back until June toppled out onto the street and was almost run over by a guy on a boke. Who the hell rode a bike at, June squinted at her watch, 6:30 in the morning? "Come on, get up."

June got up.

It turned out Chloe had brought her to what appeared to be Chloe's apartment. It was eclectic, and filled with far too many sex toys. June couldn't tell what half of them did, you couldn't fit that one anywhere. What did you need with three separate penises on one dildo?

"Oh my God," she said. "What am I doing here?"

"I thought you needed a place to sleep it off," Chloe said, her breath warm on June's neck again. "I don't have a roommate right now, I figured you could stay on the floor, or in the bathtub or something until you sober up. No offence, whatever your name is, you need a shower."

"June," June said. "My name's June. I introduced myself in the bathroom."

"Yeah, I didn't care then," Chloe shrugged. "You weren't interesting. But now that you are, you can stay here."

"I am interesting!" June protested, waving her hands over her head. "I'm fascinating! I moved here from Indiana, and I have a JOB, and…"

"Boring," Chloe said, rolling her eyes. "I'm going to bed. There are fireworks under the couch if you get bored. Feel free to let them off in the hallway, my neighbors are assholes."

Chloe disappeared between one blink and the other. James van der Beek was nowhere that June could see. Either he had never made it out o the uber or he'd never existed at all, and she had no way to tell which one of these was the most likely scenario. 

Rather than choosing the bathroom, or presumptively curling up on the couch, June's eyes rolled up into her head and she fell face first on to the floor.

* * *

It was dark again outside when June woke up. She'd had a brief hope before she fell asleep that she wouldn't remember any of last night, but she remembered all of it. Every mortifying second, including the fact that, and she'd only just realized this, how had she not seen it last night, her boss had seen her seemingly _set her ex-fiancé on fire_.

June wanted to throw up again, but she'd slept right through her hangover and was feeling less vomity and more hungry. 

Chloe was more beautiful when June was sober than when she was drunk, which was absolutely not how these things were meant to go. Her hair wasn't small snakes, it was washed and conditioned, and for goodness sake! It was just hair. Why was June fixated on hair?

Especially when Chloe was dressed in what could only be termed a sedate Catholic school girl outfit. Plaid skirt, white shirt, and was that a ribbon knotted around her neck in place of a tie? Even June didn't own a cardigan as old ladyish as the one Chloe was wearing now. Was this a new fashion June didn't know about? It had to be, which was wonderful, because it meant she'd be allowed to wear cardigans in public again without having coffee thrown on them.

Chloe was holding June's phone in her hand, the screen lit up, and June's facebook page logged in. Her messages were open, even the ones she'd been ignoring, and it looked like some of them had been responded to. 

"I answered your phone," Chloe told her. "Your boss said you're fired. I'll be home later. I used the fireworks while you were asleep. Bye."

June gaped at the back of the door, that had just been slammed in her face. 

"She does that," James van der Beek said from behind her. "You'll get used to it."

June hauled herself up gracelessly. Really, WHY were skirts this short invented? It was men, she knew it was men, if men didn't exist she'd be able to wear jeans and no one would see her underwear unless she chose to show them. June, as a rule, did not choose to show them.

"You're James van der Beek!" June said instead. "Oh my god, you're amazing, I _loved_ you in Dawson's creek, I-"

"Just James, please," James said, waving his hand at the couch June had brilliantly not slept on the night before. Her neck, and back, and strangely enough her nose are not thanking her for it. So she took the advice she should have last night and sat opposite James on the couch, folding her hands tightly in her lap.

"James," June started, and let out a breath. She had no idea what to say. What did you say to your childhood crush when you found out your soulmate was your childhood crushes' friend, and that you may have killed your ex, and… "I'm _fired_?"

"Yeah, that sucks," James said sympathetically. "I was going to be in this movie with Kiernan Shipka once, but the director was a mess, and I ended up getting fired so they could replace me with James Franco. Again."

James looked pensive. June shook her head, bewildered. How were those situations even slightly the same?

"But…I got my apartment through my job!" June said slowly. "I don't have a job anymore, and I don't have anywhere to live. What am I going to do?"

"No idea," James said with a shrug. "But Chloe doesn’t seem to mind if you stay here for a few hours, and I know for a fact she's got some great Chinese energy pills in the ottoman in her bedroom. We could take a few of them and play Mario Kart if you want?"

"No, I don't want to!" June snapped. "I've got to find a new job! And an apartment. And make sure that I didn't kill my ex-fiance last night."

"Chloe thinks you need a shower, too," James added. June glared at him. She'd always heard that you should never meet your heroes, but this was just…it was wrong was what it was. It was wrong, New York was wrong, everything was just WRONG.

June stormed off in the direction she assumed was the bathroom, finding herself, instead, in a coat closet. She ignored James laughing when she tried the next door, which did, in fact, contain a shower. She didn't care that she hadn't brought her own towel, or that there was no guest towel. What kind of person was her soulmate? Who didn't own a single guest towel?

So she used Chloe's towel, which wasn’t at all as soft and fluffy as June thought she deserved. Chloe wore brand name clothes, why was she using a towel that was so ratty it may as well have been used for the Spring cleaning June never had the time to do anymore?

Well, she had the time now.

After her shower, lacking clothes of her own, June decided to borrow an outfit of Chloe's. All her soulmate seemed to own was short skirts and dresses, but since June herself was short, most of the came down to at least her knees. While not the greatest for cleaning, at least her ass was covered. That in itself was an improvement on the last two years.

"What are you doing?" James laughed, as June stormed around the apartment looking for cleaning supplies. There was a lot of feminine wash, a bunch of perfume and so much alcohol that June almost passed out from the smell alone.

"Going out," June answered tersely. "Will you be here to let me back in?"

"Sure," James said. June huffed as loudly as her lungs would let her, making it down to the corner store in what she guessed had to be some sort of record time. 

Thankfully she still had her credit card with her, tucked it safely into her bra when she went out. Her purse was still at the club, but that was a problem she could deal with later. She didn't need ID to get rid of her incoherent rage the best way she knew how. 

Once back at the apartment, she scrubbed, and washed, and soaked and scrubbed again. The apartment was surprisingly neat and tidy on the surface, but underneath that there was years of dust and grime that needed to go.

June rubbed her knuckles raw getting the soap scum out of the shower and the bath. She scrubbed at the toilet so hard that the ceramic sounded like it was crying for forgiveness, and the oven…well, if the oven could talk it would be going to a support group right now, but damned if it didn't look properly clean when she was done.

In retrospect, June was glad the bodega had been open the evening before, because she wasn't sure how she would have spent the long, lonely night otherwise. While James had, indeed, been there to let her back in, he'd vanished again later, claiming the cleaning fluids were giving him a headache. What a bunch of hokum. Citrus and eucalyptus and that underlying scent of clean were June's favorite smells in all the world. They never failed to make her feel better.

Except this morning, with the sun coming up and her prospects going down. What were her parents going to think? They'd worked so hard to put her through grad school, and June knew they were only just starting to recover financially. She wanted to talk to her Mom so badly, but they'd barely spoken in months, since June didn't have the time to make dinner most nights, let alone phone calls. She must have missed June so much, but after the breakup with Steven, her Mom had stopped calling all that much too, and June…

June was alone. Alone in a way that she'd never thought possible. Alone in a strangers apartment, without fireworks because they'd been set off, and okay, June liked fireworks. She liked firework safety more, but they were something she and her soulmate could have in common, but June had no way to find that out, because despite knowing everything that had gone wrong for June today, her soulmate had still just…walked out.

Still left June alone.

Chloe didn't deserve a clean apartment, but darned if she wasn't going to get one, because June wasn't finished. Vacuuming took the place of tears, dusting of yelling and washing the curtains of giving up in despair. When she was finished the place looked like a show home, perfect and glistening.

There! If everything went wrong, June could still be a maid. A damned good maid. Maybe she'd have to move out of her shiny apartment, but there could still be a future here for her in New York. She wouldn't have to admit her failure to absolutely everyone, she'd still have her chance to work her way back up to Wall Street. 

She just needed not to be homeless in the in-between bit.

"I'm back," Chloe sung through the open door. She was still wearing the Catholic school skirt, but the cardigan had been cut up into little pieces and vaguely resembled a shirt, and the ribbon had been called into service as the world's flimsiest belt. She looked like a supermodel, and June looked like a ragamuffin.

There was still a sponge in her hand. June only noticed this when it left her hand in a perfect arc and smacked Chloe right in the face.

"That's a strange way of saying thank you," Chloe said, with a moue of disappointment. 

"Thank you?" June said dumbly. "For what?"

"For saving your job," Chloe said, tossing what appeared to be a series of polaroids at June. There was Chloe outside June's office building. Chloe rubbing up against a guard in the lobby. Chloe in June's office, and…

"Hey!" June yelped. "You can't do that with my stapler!"

"Too late," Chloe said, and grinned. "You'd be surprised what you can turn into a sex toy in a pinch."

"I don't want to be surprised," June protested, but it was to deaf ears. Chloe was stripping down right in front of her, _still not wearing underwear_ , still showing June's words. sJune had believed, just a little, that they would vanish while she and Chloe were apart. 

"Everyone wants to know that. Anyway, it was easy."

 

"What was easy?" June asked. Chloe looked down at her, like she was looking over a pair of sunglasses she wasn't wearing and rolled her eyes. June had begun to think that eye rolling was Chloe's default expression. Like her eyes weren't meant to face forward, but up instead.

"Getting your job back, June, pay attention."

Chloe reached over and grabbed the photos from June, sorting through them and tossing the ones she didn't want across the living room that June had just cleaned like frisbees. 

"I spent hours on that!" She squawked. She dived for the closest one, determined to return her perfect order. Chloe caught her, caught the back of Chloe's own dress, and hauled June back up.

"On what?" Chloe asked rhetorically, picking through her pile of pictures. "Oooh, look at this one, it's my favorite."

'Her favorite' was a picture of Chloe and June's boss on June's bosses' office chair. June herself had never been allowed in that office, but it was basically legendary. There was a photo of it in the lobby. Chloe was wearing the school girl uniform as it had been last night, before it had had it's accident with a wood chipper or a particularly pissed off squirrel. She wasn't sure which of these was more common in New York.

"You seduced my boss?" June asked, her voice going up with every syllable. "You can't do that!"

"Oh, I know," Chloe said, bored. She pointed at a particularly disturbing photo of Chloe on a random filing cabinet, legs spread, June's words lit by a strategically placed floor lamp, and decorated with squiggly, colourful highlighter marks. "Oh, yeah, that's yours."

"Huh?" June said dumbly.

"Anyway, I didn't seduce him, that's so last year."

"But…the uniform!" 

"Oh, I had a costume party afterwards. I hate getting changed in bathrooms, it's so tacky."

"Then how?" June spluttered. She was three seconds off reaching over to throttle Chloe. She'd spent this long without a soulmate, she was sure she could build the rest of her life around not having one. Find a nice widower, maybe? With a couple of adorable kids that would love to be part of a blended family.

"How what? You're not making a bit of sense, June," Chloe said breezily. She reached past June, doing the breath against the neck thing, and this time June shivered. June thought she might be about to get a comforting hug, but Chloe stopped just short, wrapping her long fingers around the stem of a martini glass, bringing it to her lips and taking a long drink.

Chloe had pretty lips. June didn't think she wanted to kiss them, except for the part of her that did. She didn't like girls, but this one was…naked. This one was fully naked again. Great. 

"How did you get me my job back," June said, teeth gritted. 

"Oh, that. Well, when I convinced the guards to let me into your office so I could get all your stuff, I went through your computer for a bit. No porn, June, I'm disappointed," Chloe started, sounding like it might be a lengthy monologue.

"I don't watch porn at work!" June spluttered. Chloe looked interested, and June had to rush to explain herself. "I don't watch porn! Not everyone watches porn!"

"Of course they do, remind me to show you some of my favorites," Chloe continued. She held up one of the photos, which was just a picture of her in the same pose she was in now, holding up a USB key. It was like one of those pictures of someone wearing a t-shirt that had a picture of them wearing a t-shirt on it, and it just went on forever. "So while I was going through your computer I found all your files, and they were so boring June, I can't even describe it.

But then when I went into your bosses office to find some blackmail material, I went through his computer, and I found out that he'd been embezzling, which is one of my favorite words and hobbies, and-"

"He was what?" June stopped her, holding up her hand. "He couldn't have been. I was the one doing the auditing!"

"You did a good job," Chloe said approvingly. "I wouldn't have been able to find his bullshit without it."

"How did you? Find it I mean?" June asked. "Oh my God, I'm bad at my job. I deserved to be fired!"

"Nah, you were okay. I have a masters degree in business and accounting, and I've embezzled from a few companies, so I know what I'm looking for," Chloe said. She smiled at June proudly, like June should be proud of herself and Chloe too.

"But…I did the audits. How did this save my job?" June shook her head, baffled. 

"You did the audits," Chloe grinned, like the cat that got the cream. "So I just submitted it to the whistleblower line and the SCC under your name, and told them you'd been fired as retaliation for finding it. They were begging to give you your job back. You might even get promoted. Y'know…if you want to keep doing something that boring."

June laughed just a little, twisted her body so she sat on the back of the lounge, and then fell over it onto the cushions. On her back, looking up at the ceiling, June let a few of the terrified tears she'd been holding back out and wiped them away with the back of her hand.

"Why? Why would you do that for me?" June noted she'd missed a few cobwebs around the ceiling light, and wondered whether she'd ever get the chance to fix that.

"You are my soulmate," Chloe said, plonking herself down on the floor beside June. "And I don't hate you, which is okay, I guess. So do you want to move in?"

"What?" June squeaked, turning over so quickly she had to yank her head back to prevent her mushing it into Chloe's. "But…I got my job back!"

"So?" Chloe asked. She looked at June strangely, then leaned forward and kissed her lightly on the lips. June, rather than kissing back, flapped her lips like a fish, which couldn't have been at all pleasant or attractive. "I'm fun to live with, and I only drove away my last roommate last week. I could get a new one, but if we're going to do the purse scam, I don't need that money anymore."

"The purse what?" June asked, tangling her fingers in Chloe's hair. It was a little wet, so it did seem a little ropey, a little snakey. "I have an apartment."

"Suit yourself," Chloe said, contorting somehow so that she was lying on her back on the carpet, her legs in the air. She was _still naked_ June's confused mind pointed out to her, but that just seemed normal now. Chloe bent her knees and her feet ended up in June's lap. "I'm bored. Entertain me. And make it interesting, you're starting to get boring."

"I set my ex-fiance on fire last night," June offered, because it was the most interesting thing she'd done…well…ever. June wasn't boring, but excitement wasn't something she could offer on a regular basis.

"That's my favourite thing about you," Chloe sighed contentedly. "That's when I knew I could tolerate you."

"And, uh…I licked James van der Beek," June continued, wincing. 

"I've done that. Did he taste like toilet water to you too?"

"How do you know what toilet water tastes like?" June asked, recoiling her hands from where she'd started giving Chloe an unthinking foot rub.

"How do you not?" Chloe counters. "Anyway, I don't mind if you do that again. It's only fair. I've slept with him, you should too."

"I'm not going to sleep with him!" June protests. "You're my soulmate, how can you be okay with that? Wait…did you sleep with someone last night?"

"No," Chloe said sadly. "I knew you'd be the type that'd have a problem with it. It's not like you want to sleep with me, is it?"

"Yes," June said. "No. I don't know, I've barely slept with anyone, how am I supposed to be able to tell?"

Chloe smirked, swinging her legs off June's lap and sitting up. She slid slowly on to the couch, with what June thought was meant to be a sultry expression on her face. June recoiled, just a little, just enough that when Chloe put one hand on each side of her head, June had nowhere to move.

"I've slept with everyone, I'm sure I can help you work it out," Chloe stage whispered. June gulped and pointedly didn't look at Chloe's lips. Chloe tilted her head, and looked at the martini glass she'd left on the table just behind the couch they're both sitting on. "You're a homebody right? Wanna get fucked up on pills and play Mario Kart?"

June kissed her instead. It seemed like the easier option; she'd never been any good at video games.


End file.
